Nigel Hill’s ashes were taken along with power tools from garage in Bury, Greater Manchester, in September
A woman whose father’s ashes were stolen in a burglary has urged the culprit to show compassion, saying: “I feel like I’ve lost him twice.”
Nigel Hill’s ashes were stolen along with some power tools from a garage at the home in Bury, Greater Manchester, that he had shared with his wife, Susan. He died aged 72 in January.
Continue reading...Cost and difficulties of balancing work and childcare has led one in 10 to quit, says Fawcett Society
About a quarter of a million mothers with young children have left their jobs because of difficulties with balancing work and childcare, according to a report by an equal rights charity that calls for the end of the “motherhood penalty”.
This juggling act, as well as the punitive cost, has led more than 249,124 working mothers of children aged four or under to leave their employer, according to the Fawcett Society.
Continue reading...The El-Naklas left Gaza on Friday but other British citizens are struggling to get out
The parents-in-law of Scotland’s first minister, Humza Yousaf, have arrived safely in Scotland after fleeing the conflict in Gaza, while dozens of other British citizens struggle to leave.
Yousaf shared a family photo of his wife, Nadia, and her parents, Elizabeth and Maged El-Nakla, surrounded by their relatives.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Special rapporteur Olivier De Schutter to urge ministers to increase welfare spending on visit to country this week
Poverty levels in the UK are “simply not acceptable” and the government is violating international law, the United Nations’ poverty envoy has said ahead of a visit to the country this week, when he will urge ministers to increase welfare spending.
Olivier De Schutter, the UN’s special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, cited research showing universal credit payments of £85 a week for single adults over 25 were “grossly insufficient” and described the UK’s main welfare system as “a leaking bucket”.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Regulator extends part suspension of licence to July 2024 after IT blunder led to incorrect dosage of cancer treatment
A private health company paid millions by the NHS has failed to fix safety defects that led to the death of a cancer patient, the Guardian can reveal.
Three patients were hospitalised and a fourth died when they were given the wrong doses of a powerful chemotherapy drug after a catastrophic IT failure at the medicine manufacturing unit of Sciensus in April this year.
Continue reading...Police called to farm in Scotland after ‘scary’ visit by by animal rights protesters
Police have been called to a farm in Scotland where “Britain’s loneliest sheep” was due to be taken following her rescue from the foot of a cliff, after animal rights activists were accused of intimidating staff.
The volunteer group Animal Rising took part in a peaceful protest outside Dalscone Farm Fun over the expected arrival of Fiona, who was rescued by a group of farmers on Saturday after two years stuck at the foot of a cliff.
Continue reading...UK government fears further unrest in spite of reassurances from organisers about march avoiding Cenotaph
The UK deputy prime minister, Oliver Dowden, has reiterated the government’s “grave concerns” about pro-Palestinian marches on Armistice Day despite assurances from organisers about avoiding the Cenotaph and the timing of their rally.
Following the injury on Saturday to four policeman and the arrest of 29 people at a rally in London against Israeli attacks on Gaza, Dowden said fruther demonstrations planned for next Saturday, 11 November, could lead to more unrest. He also said the rallies could be misconstrued as a sign of intimidation, especially towards the Jewish community.
Continue reading...Fear adds to Russia-Ukraine conflict risk and increases ‘probability of European and of US recession’
A global recession could be triggered by the conflict in the Middle East as the humanitarian crisis compounds the challenges facing an already precarious world economy, two of Wall Street’s biggest names warned this weekend.
Larry Fink, chief executive of the world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, said a combination of the Hamas atrocities of 7 October, Israel’s resultant attack on Gaza and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year had pushed the world “almost to a whole new future”.
Continue reading...Peers express fears that Jagtar Singh Johal will not receive ‘due process’ in India amid torture claims
Assurances by a UK minister that a British man imprisoned in India will receive a fair trial fly in the face of evidence that he has been tortured and arbitrarily detained, three lawyers who held senior public roles have warned.
To coincide with the sixth anniversary of Jagtar Singh Johal’s detention, Ken MacDonald KC, Elish Angiolini KC and Jim Wallace KC have written to the UK Foreign Office minister Lord Ahmad asking him to retract his recent comments saying that the British citizen would receive “due process” in India.
Continue reading...Angela Rayner says party’s housing recovery plan will enact reforms delayed by Tories since 2019 manifesto commitments
Labour will deliver more action on housing in the first six months of office than the Conservatives have delivered in the past six years, Angela Rayner has pledged.
Downing Street has confirmed the renters reform bill will be in the king’s speech, allowing it to continue its passage through parliament when the next session opens on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Conservatives furious at PM’s ‘naive’ meeting with Musk ahead of last Westminster session before election
Tory MPs have accused Rishi Sunak of “offering the electorate dystopia” after an appearance with Elon Musk in which the billionaire warned that artificial intelligence could take everyone’s jobs and leave them searching for meaning in their lives.
Many MPs were left baffled by the prime minister’s decision to conduct an interview with the Tesla and X (formerly Twitter) owner at the end of the AI safety summit at Bletchley Park. However, some are furious about the event, which painted a bleak picture of the future.
Continue reading...Protesters converge on square after sit-ins at Oxford Circus and Charing Cross station and chants outside BBC
Thousands of protesters have gathered in Trafalgar Square demanding a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war.
Chants – including the contentious “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” as well as “Ceasefire now!” – rang out, as some protesters climbed on top of bus stops and let off green and red flares.
Continue reading...British-Iranian imprisoned in Iran for six years speaks of slow recovery from captivity and severance from her Iranian family
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has spoken of her “constant worry” about her family in Iran, saying she cannot return to the country where she was imprisoned for six years.
The British-Iranian also revealed how it had been “very hard to adjust” since returning to the UK in March 2022.
Continue reading...Leaked documents spark furious backlash from groups who fear freedom of expression could be suppressed
Government officials have drawn up deeply controversial proposals to broaden the definition of extremism to include anyone who “undermines” the country’s institutions and its values, according to documents seen by the Observer.
The new definition, prepared by civil servants working for cabinet minister Michael Gove, is fiercely opposed by a cohort of officials who fear legitimate groups and individuals will be branded extremists.
Continue reading...Shadow foreign secretary toughens line on Israel-Palestine in light of ‘shocking number’ of dead civilians
Labour has warned that the “siege conditions” in place in Gaza are unacceptable and called for an immediate humanitarian pause to the fighting, in the party’s strongest intervention over Israel’s intensifying war against Hamas.
David Lammy, the shadow foreign secretary who visited the region last week, said that the “number of dead Palestinian civilians and children is shocking” as he called on Israel to take further steps to stop a “humanitarian catastrophe”. He said that Israel “must uphold international law” and also warned of violence in the West Bank.
Continue reading...Senior Conservative says home secretary should not discuss complex issue in such terms and advised her to use ‘wiser’ language
Suella Braverman has been rebuked by a senior Tory campaigner on homelessness after the home secretary provoked outrage by describing rough sleeping as a “lifestyle choice.”
Bob Blackman MP, head of the all-party parliamentary group for ending homelessness, said Braverman was wrong to discuss a complex and serious issue in such terms and advised her to use “wiser” language.
Continue reading...Free Palestine Coalition’s sit-in stops traffic in central shopping district as protests continue across UK over Israel-Hamas war
More than 350 protesters shut down part of Oxford Street on Saturday as they staged a sit-in protest during the shopping district’s busiest hours.
The demonstration, organised by the Free Palestine Coalition, a collective of grassroots groups standing in solidarity with Palestine, occupied a busy junction and stopped traffic for more than an hour by sitting down in the road.
Continue reading...Met Office issues yellow weather alert as heavy rain forecast to fall on already saturated ground
Heavy rain is forecast across south and south-west of England, with 38 flood warnings and 160 flooding alerts in place days after Storm Ciarán hit the UK.
Although Storm Ciarán has largely eased, the Met Office issued a yellow weather notice on Saturday to last until 11.59pm, stretching from Kent to Cornwall.
Continue reading...Investigation finds evidence that many calls received prior to 2021 Channel disaster were treated as less urgent
UK coastguards downgraded 999 calls from refugees pleading for help as they headed to England days before the worst Channel disaster for decades, new internal documents reveal.
HM Coastguard potentially breached its own policy by categorising 999 calls from distressed passengers on as many as four small boats carrying 155 people as not in need of urgent rescue, according to analysis of incident logs obtained by the Observer and Liberty Investigates.
Continue reading...Higher interest rates and move away from cash isas means hundreds of thousands more people may be hit
Higher interest rates look set to land hundreds of thousands more people with an unwelcome tax bill for their savings, a financial advice firm warned this week.
A couple of years ago it was typically only the wealthiest with very big nest eggs who had to pay tax on their savings interest – but now someone with an emergency savings pot of about £8,000 could find themselves falling foul of this little-known tax trap.
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